Full power, twenty-four hour!

Communal breakfast at Durga’s, Dorien orders up momos – a Tibetan vegetarian dumpling affair that takes some preparation. It transpires that everyone knows the plan from the off, so I must have been concentrating on my food last night when the itinerary was hatched. Always the last to know….We’re not halfway down the high street with the living temple Virupaksha as our backdrop when we stop for coffee – turns out Eyal is an afficionado – and this is the only place that does a proper espresso – he has pictures of real coffee and cakes stored on his camera from somewhere up north – to remind him of when he found the cake oasis in the coffee desert. Strange fella. I haven’t drunk coffee for twenty years because the stuff gave me insomnia for over a decade and that’s a long time…..when you want to sleep; still, I’m not bitter about it. I settle on a maaza – bright orange pseudo-mango ‘juice’, mix it with a bottle of soda water and spark up a fag. My body is a temple. Its been a half-hour so I head back to pick up the now-ready momos, trundle back and off we set – maybe an hour behind an ideal schedule but still timely for a full days derring-do.

Quick trawl up and down the ceremonial procession to Ackyuta-Kaya temple, see if the millipede is still there….that’s one of the big dark brown ones, not the fluffy cute ones, with the segmented exoskeleton that you don’t want to find underfoot. They’re pretty big, impressive in a horrific sort of fashion and in all respects rather disturbing. (Two years ago on Arambol I accidently cut one in half with the door – took him nearly five minutes to die. Buried him with full honours, apologised to God, felt like shit for 3 days and couldn’t stop worrying about his big brother coming for revenge at 4 in the morning. Arambol is that kind of place.)
He wasn’t there so instead we smelt the bat urine, cogitated on the stonework and the heaviness thereof, and made no end of wholly uninformed speculations about the blatant madness of the long-gone Vijayanagar Empire. How they loved their stone!

Up the rocks with no name – no major struggle but gaining height quickly through exertion, and the occasional skirmish with what ***n calls ‘undue vegetation’……thats ‘undue’ as in ‘ever so slightly bothersome!’ We take a smoko and water-guzzle near the top, admire the view, admire each other, get the cameras out and collectively decide that life is OK, and we’re pretty damn cool. With higher to go and the bit between my teeth I steal a march – the going is pleasingly energetic – not challenging, just a straight trade-off: you want more height, you pay with energy. Got to the front edge of the 2nd highest rock before the rest saw me, and from there I could see the highest rock was also manageable. Effectively a very large boulder, topped with a ridge like a gently-inverted ”v’. One foot either side of the ridge, I shuffle to the front and am at the highest point In Hampi this side of the Elephant rock summit and Hanuman (monkey) temple in the middle distance. Much whooping and encouragement from the crew, so I breathe yet more deeply, and crouching till now, legs shaking, I stand up and straighten my legs.

The view is exhilarating, life-affirming – and sphincter-tightening! It’s a long way up. Having locked my knees, the fear has transferred from the legs to the breathing: I pause on an exhale, call to mind yoga teacher #2 (Ishwara Kaur): “allow the breath to regulate itself”, calm down a bit and relax both the knees and the breathing, then suck in the panoply laid out before me, slowly twisting from right to left and back. I suspect a major photo opportunity so whilst Dorien and Zorge have the cameras out I treat them to an alfresco Tai Chi/ Chi Kung mash-up. Sensing that this is what the psychologists call a ‘peak experience’, and in this case literally, I ham it up good and proper, the girls clicking away to my ego’s content. Fan-tastic!
No way is Zoja going to take this lying down, so up she clambers, me transferring to the 2nd rock to make way – because….’there can be only one’.
She and I get down, reconvene with the others and head to the back end of the ridge to take stock, gauge distance and plan stage 3 –barely reached a consensus and the girls are off, haring down the rocks making the route up on the hoof – there’s no holding them back! We descend – at a somewhat foolhardy pace – to sunken temple point (Purandara Dasara mandapam), pause for a breather – it’s not just energetic, it is very very hot. Splash the feet, watch kids piss in the river, and take an allegedly refreshing sugarcane drink (revolting, but….you know? – authentic). Indian families picknicking….much staring.Too tired to stare back.

Zoja joins in the haggling for a coracle to coracle point, we pile in and enjoy the ride – five of us plus daybags and the oarsman, a little adventure in its own right. I hunker down in the middle, trying not to get my arse wet in the two inches of bilge at the centre. Land – not far ’til we can have some lunch – past no-name temple being renovated, (allegedly – there’s little sign of industry!) across the granite stepping stones, up the incline to Hanuman guest house, where ***n and I lunched a week or so ago. No lunch today though….nor cold fizz (bit early for beer)…no tanda pani either – nothing, in fact. We sit and regain strength, Eyal and the girls investigate the 60 day old cow in the garden – the family are feeding her up on the best grass, and already she looks a cut above the rest. I indicate the well where the wife or her girl does the dishes – she nods, I draw water from the hand pump and drink deep from a tin ‘matka’ – just as good!
***n is not joining us for the Hanuman temple trek – he’s ‘been there done that’ – but it surprises me, given the opportunity to lead a climb – because there’s no way these girls will settle for going up the steps, they have revealed themselves as Amazons, and Zoja likes to lead from the front. I wonder what he’ll do, given there’s no lunch in the offing and we’ll be gone for 2-3 hours. Not till later do I suspect he’s going for a sneaky traverse to find the northeast passage or backtrack to the Elephant rock’s arse-end and the presumed ‘spinal ascent’.

Off we head, stony track veering right – couldn’t get a rickshaw down here – rice paddies, banana tree fields and a nameless village: in lieu of lunch, bottles of mango juice (mango-ish), tanda pani and peanut cookies. Then on to the prize in the distance, past fields so green, man, it was like being back in ‘Naam *. Onwards to the base of the hill, and much entreaty to buy the obligatory coconuts – to offer to the monkeys we think, but these things are a little fuzzy round the edges, – as are monkeys. Coconuts also, come to that. There’s an irrigation affair running round the base – in ye olden days we would prolly have called it a moat (moat-ette maybe– it doesn’t look too defensive). We head left, looking for a footbridge (or bridg-ette), but after 300 yards its looking ‘negatory’ as the Marines used to say….(Semper Fi, dude)** so it looks like we’re going to get wet.
There is however, a tree…with a rope – no tyre, but still ‘baha acha’. Shoes-offage and chucking, toe-dipping and trouser roller-upping ensues, followed by a liberal dose of Tarzan impressions and photo-opportunism. We’re across. I forge ahead, seeking the path of least resistance, wondering if I’ve assumed leadership because the opportunity has presented itself, or because I’m still a slave to the tediously Neanderthal imperative to impress the girls.
Wish I was sexy instead of just deep.
Jumping from rock to rock – this is not mountaineering, not ‘freeclimbing’, not really achievement – but balance, judging distance and gradient, trusting your footwear and your grip – is hugely pleasing. It has been said little things please little minds – well so be it. The others soon catch up, Eyal if off to the right, finding his own path, the girls will brook no leadership – on fire once again.
If it had been a race there’s no doubt Eyal would have been ‘king of the castle’ – whilst quietly spoken (yeah I know, Israel – are you sure?) – he displays some gazelle-like qualities. Truly, only in the wild can the majesty of such a creature be seen (c.BBC). In truth its easygoing – upward progress, no real danger – always aiming for the ‘saddle’ atop which sits the sole tree acting as a beacon. From afar, if it weren’t for the monkey temple itself, you’d call it ‘one tree hill’. That this tree should find root directly above the path of least resistance is one of those happenstances for which there is neither rhyme nor reason. There maybe, but you’ll burn a circuit trying – so don’t.
There’s a final surprise as we negotiate a quarter-ton stepping stone that doesn’t look like it balances on a fulcrum..…but does – wibble wobble but don’t fall down – then no more than 30 minutes from Tarzan point we crest the plateau, bang in line with the tree. Well done us, top marks!
It’s rarified. We individually go about circumambulating the plateau, no real need for words. I look South backwards towards Hampi, clocking the summit of Elephant rock, the top tier of the Virupaksha temple mantapa, the desolate junior monkey temple on Mathunga hills (which I will scale several days hence), and Chi kung photo point. I think we are now clearly higher, but unless you know your arc and azimuth from your zenith and degree of elevation – it’s not easy. Trained observer.
You can however see for miles, and the seemingly haphazard distribution of banana plantations and rice paddies, seldom square and rarely symmetrical, is a wonder to behold. Here and there the greenery is interspersed with a minor outcropping of the stone which, in its billion different bizarre manifestations, forms the overwhelmingly most impactful aspect of this geography. It stretches for as far as the eye can see – and up here, that’s a big stretch. Sandpit of the gods.
After privately slapping ourselves on the back, and a smoke, we break out the momos, complete with bags of an unidentifiable dayglo red sauce so rich in additives its radioactive. being a health-conscious kind of guy, and having forgotten to take breakfast, I dunk mine like depth charges, and swill them down with water that’s now hotter than you’d have your tea. Such relentless suffering! The monkeys entertain us by their little rock pool, sipping, fighting, picking each other’s bums and eating the proceeds. No shit; – well, some shit obviously…….
Its hard to leave but time waits for no man – so I get itchy feet, possibly more aware than the rest that we must make ferryman point by 6 – but its hard to leave. At least twice everybody goes for an individual last look at a view that is not only unique, but that may never be seen again. A voice in the head says….suck this in, and deeply – because chances are you will never be here again. Ferryman point or no, thats a hard voice to ignore. From a previous life the field commander stepped in, I chivvy everyone along and we run the ‘baksheesh gauntlet’ (Rs10, we got away cheap!) – not quite sure why one should get paid for living at the top of a hill, but hey-ho!
Down, down, down the 572 steps or however many to the base, admiring them old devil-eyed goats blithely chomping away halfway up as we descend. ***n has pitched up at point zero, gesticulating about the time and indicating the rickshaw he has arranged – the owner of which is now everybody’s best mate – bless him. Can’t remember why it was essential that I pay for ***n’s coconut but I’m a good little boy and do as I’m told. We pile in and off we go – but pitstop at the village with no name for tanda pani, Rs50 bottle of the ‘maa’ (maaza same same) and a tin of kingfisher for Eyal. It’s a 5-seater, kinda, and the girls opt for what is really a parcel shelf at the back – much better view though, apparently. Truly poetic – until it becomes the bumpiest rickshaw ride in history. The view becomes strictly academic when even at 3kph the girls are hitting their heads on the roof, hitting their teeth on the water bottles, Eyal’s beer is going everywhere except his mouth and everybody’s best buddy Johnny 4foot, rides shotgun like a monkey singing bollywood blockbusters – its all so authentically chaotic my balls ache. Class ride.
Looks like we’d given up on ferryman point because we ended at Hanuman guest house – cross the semi-submerged granite stepping stones, past the temple under renovation and thence to coracle point. no coracle in sight – this side or the other. We have to get Zoja back because it’s her last day – she’s to be on the train from Hospet at 9. We wave and whistle to no avail. In time, and we’ve not much to spare, two old biddys finish their collecting up of fishing nets in their coracle and take her over to landing point – we wave and agree by shouting to meet at chill-out for dinner should she have time, and to send the biddys back for us…..which doesn’t happen. I lie myself down on the flat warm stone and warm the belly….which is not unpleasant.
***n Eyal and Dorien choose to swim whilst we wait for a coracle. I guard the bags and calculate no more than 30-40 minutes of daylight left. I could have been Victorian and averted my gaze when Dorien stripped down to undergarmentage to reveal a lithe yet bounteous physique – but I didn’t…..doesn’t make me a bad man – shit, I’m guarding the bags ain’t I? Warm the belly some more.
The clock is really ticking but a family pitch up with a coracle on their heads. Uh-huh. The tireless trio decide to swim it – that’s my kind of swim, and I feel a pang of regret that I’m not in there with them. I negotiate for myself and the bags, load them in and step into the coracle, watch them swimming as I’m rowed across. At landing point the oarsman naturally decides that the previous negotiation was merely preamble and that I should pay for each bag as a complete passenger. From some angles fair enough – but it’s not what we had agreed. How unpredictable! I dispatch him using ‘voce gravitas’ because more serious things are afoot. Even ***n struggles tho he has taken the best line, and his advice to Eyal and Dorien to counter the current seems to have gone unheeded. It may well look placid but this is still the Tungabhadra that comes down from Sanapur dam, splits 2 ways to the west of broken bridge and turns Viruppa Gaddi into Hampi island.
Dorien is making slow progress, ***n and Eyal are faring better but are clearly knackered. She’s not floundering, but if she can’t counter or get beyond the current it will sap her strength while she just keeps station. We will soon be where the right thing to do is dive in and bring it to a conclusion – ***n and Eyal have landed, but are wholly spent, strength ebbed to nothing. Something tells me the time is not yet – I have seen her climb and forge ahead……. at the moment it’s only worrying, not serious. With a running dive and the current in my favor, I could be with her in 4 seconds. If she needs me she will wave, and if I move too soon I’ll deny her the victory, and look bloody silly into the bargain.
She makes it, they dry off, I shoulder the bags and we hotfoot it for the 600 yard traverse across user friendly rocks to the Kobandarama temple. The bloody things get everywhere. The light fails just as we get off the rocks and we’re back on familiar territory – through the monkey tunnel, ignore the semi-saddhu who thinks its his tunnel (baksheesh gauntlet reprise) – and double time it back to our respective hovels for a quick shower and fresh duds, to reconvene at ‘Chill-out’ .
Fresh, flushed, scrubbed up and pumped, over milkoffee, chai, banana honey pancake or dall fry and chapatti, we recount individual perspectives on the 8 phase day’s adventure. Zoja pitched up with her backpack the size of a Bergen, sick as a green thing that she didn’t also get to swim across coracle point. We do the photo review and email swap thing, tell each other again, ‘you were great man, you DID that!’ , all to the secretly rapt attention of everyone there who hadn’t…..planned their day in advance.
All things must pass, and Zorge is off to meet a friend flying in to Bangalore, thence to Cochin. After hugs all round she tells us she’s had a blinding time and that ‘its people who make places’ – which I’d never heard before, but if true is probably why I’ve been in Hampi for three and a half weeks.

Adam x

* bit of a lie actually, – wasn’t in Vietnam. Too young, they said.
** wasn’t even in the marines.

‘this is where the rubber meets the road!’

6th day and as if by Magick the waters have receded, the trees, festooned in their canopies with reeds and rubbish from up river can breathe again, and I re-acquaint myself the ferryman – an important office…as the Greeks and Romans coulda done told ya. But they’re dead so fuck ‘em.
Look around, suss the the going rate, check in at Shanti (Hampiside)guest house, Rs150.
Bump into ***n and Mark, a Saath Lun’dun geezer……establish the bona fides, share the supplies, catch up with ***n and because we’re drinking get kicked out of Sri whatsisguruface restaurant…..

‘Sa Lundun fing…..Innit.

Adam x
‘this is where the rubber meets the road!’

Thats all behind us now, and for the princely rent of Rs50 am staying in a bamboo,mud and banana leaf construction that is popularly referred to as a ‘hut’. After nearly a week of drinking and fighting with ***n, we’d just about had it up to the back teeth with each other, and thrashing him resoundingly at ‘A to Z’ was no longer the fun it had once been.
He was on a solo mission to Hospet to check his freshly-sent ATM card worked, which was a pretty good cover story for what was in fact a military scale rum run. I was still recovering from the previous nights’ bout of his arsey drunken cantankerousness, and thats how I met ‘Honey’* – she of the curly hair and lovely mouth, scouting the island to escape the relentless commercial clamor of Hampiside.She took a hut. You know what they say about Israeli women……they’re from Israel.
Rum and cokes, joints and games of chess ensue, she and her friend, ***n and I…..she lasted 2 days and shipped out, saying she didn’t wish to ‘live in a pub’. Weak.
***n has to go on another 3 day covert mission to ^^^^^^, leaving me as pretty much the only Pharang on the island to slug it out with the laughing Buddhas fridgeful of Kingfisher. Bastard. I’m now on 1st name terms with whatsisface, ‘the rum man’ – last house on the island. The 800 yard trek to replenish my supplies of ‘Old Monk’, afternoon rock climbing notwithstanding, is my 3 or 4pm ritual, in addition to the 10am and 6pm river check – because the river has risen a tad in the last couple of days.
On 2 outings we have made 4 attempts to scale ‘Elephant Rock’, wholeheartedly at that, and each time have been rebuffed convincingly with the silent disdain that is the preserve of the prim and haughty, hulking fat sow that she is, dominating the skyline….nay the very psyche of Hampi island (or Virupappur Gaddhi as the local authorities have vainly renamed it.) The Elephant rock – so named because from every perspective save one it resembles a….very large pile of big rocks – is happy enough for you to truffle about in her petticoats, but she doesn’t allow just anyone to plough her furrow…..
Its low season – apparently they don’t gear up here till January – and its all very ‘shanti shanti’. For me, a bit too shanti. I pop over to Hampiside every so often, you know, to pick up on the vibe because man, I am just so down with that hippie groove…..but have to be back on the island by 6pm. Why? – because the ferryman says so. Thinking that mebe I’m missing out on some of that hot-rocking Hampiside action (Dig?) I ask Ojo to tot-up the bill, I repack the bag and prepare to de-camp the next day – Ahs’a gonna make me some lurve with some mighty fine pantaloons-wearin’ anklechain janglin’ backpackin’ womans.
Up bright and breezy, all chipper with the scent of fresh misadventure and the promise of what salacious iniquities i can mire myself in next, I pay the bill as Ojo tells me the river has risen…..
If by risen you mean overnight turn a 30 yard babbling brook into a (insert hugely impressive figure here) 200 yard wide billion gallon raging torrent 35 feet(ooooh at least) higher than it was,submerging the whole valley plain (well valley-ish), trees and all, including the 1st 2 levels of the Mango tree restaurant, that the police will allow neither ferryboat nor coracle to cross because 2 years ago a boat capsized at high river and 8 people died….then yes, the river has risen.

Borrocksh! I hotfoot it to the broken bridge (rum man) end – you know, just to check that water does find its own level (abstruse physics joke, might have picked it up in the navy) – the rum man’s courtyard is 18 inches above the big wetness. There’s a semi-paved road out there – i walked it 3 days ago, that’s now 35 feet(oooh, at least) underwater. there’s a copse of trees to my right thats now doing its annual seaweed impression. We are stranded.
I ain’t goin nowhere – and neither’s anyone else, including the rum man, and we can safely conclude his supply chain is forseeably suspended. Little voice at the back of my head suggests I check out the health of his stocks. I put my ‘Chinese Gordon’** hat on, paid the requisite rupees, and laid in a private stock of 7 bottles.
I mean, SHIT! – times like these a mans gotta think ahead.

Adam x

* er….not her real name.
** Gordon of Khartoum, leader of the British garrison at the ‘Siege of Khartoum’

‘this is where the rubber meets the road!’

‘You shameless fuck’, I think to myself, having ordered a pot of tea at the Taj Mahal (Rs250) in surroundings so luxurious you have a choice…..you can slink away like a prairie dog after the lions have made their kill,…. or you can straighten your backbone and recall your headmaster saying ‘god helps those who helps themselves’ – or if you come from California – ‘fake it till you make it’. Like you belong there………

To think that some people actually live like this – the paint is even, the light fixtues, which work, are level, the coving, coping, architrave, skirting board and ancilliary fittings are level, clean, ship-shape and Bristol fashion. The carpets are fresh and the rooms are so big you can’t see the walls. Corn in Egypt!

Its my last night in Mumbai, the kung fu silks are in the laundry and I’ve made the right choices – after a suprisingly trauma-free train ticket buying sojourn to Victoria terminus window 52……..a nice pot of English breakfast at the Taj…..i gots me a (fake) New York gangstah at 11 o’clock trying to get thru to ‘me bitches’ or ‘ma homeboys’ styling hisself out as a DJ and Rachmaninov in the background is painting a picture exceedingly surreal. I’m at a window seat in the ‘Sea Lounge’ overlooking what must be the the South East view….but its 2am so all I can see in the window is the reflection of a cowboy hat that doesn’t really belong here, that they think belongs to a filmstar – because the 1st episode of ‘Mohne Rana Dey’ has aired – and a customer at cafe Mondegar recognized me (its him off the telly!). The maitre D said the 2nd pot would be on him…..which recalls to mind a guy that Putney Jock, Leicester Bob and myself met in a pub round the back of the Barbican (know all the hotspots,me!) – claimed he set up the helicopter ambulance service for Devon and Cornwall – ‘Its not what a man is,’ says he, ‘its what a man appears to be’……

There’s a jack-up rig lying a mile offshore in the harbour – I clocked it when I 1st revisited the ‘Gateway to India’ (currently a refurbishing botchjob) – and I’m going to have to find out why – it could be there’s no mystery – might just be lying offshore waiting for its next exploratory lease-job, in the nearest available water. It transpires they’re just fishing, if you know what i mean – if they find oil here in significant deposits, its going to change the geopolitical dynamics faster than you can you say ‘……oh hello, China on my doorstep’. But thats a picture for another time…..the ‘down wit dat’ muthas have split, which leaves me as the sole customer in a dining room the size of Texas…..and I’ve just ordered me up a pack of marlboro light @ Rs169 – my streetside camel lite cost me 75…..but its 3:30am – whadjagonnado?

Some of you know full well that I’m the kind of guy who knows how to behave…..so I affirm and re-affirm with Ritesh (nightshift chief Cahuna and don’t you forget it) that I’m not depriving him of sleep….shit it must cost them more just to keep the lights on….and hunker down for my 3rd pot of tea – think I’ll stretch them a bit and ask for Earl Grey – but given that even the ceiling tiles in the bogs are made of marble – I dont think they’ll break sweat!

I set the alarms on my (now functioning) mobile, because between now and …..bout 12 hours, i have to work out if i can half-inch an ashtray from the SBX sports bar for *****n, and remain Karma-free…….they are pleasing to the eye, even if only because you can’t see the seam and unless one is an engineer or lathe-master, you cannot work out how they are made. Those of you who know the Hong Kong Joe Bananas beach towel story know it cant be done – its right up there with killing the guy whose wife you stole – if it aint yours, dont take it. (here endeth the lesson)……

Anyway – I’m going to run, and not to Mohenjdro Daro – I’m going South….its not mission unaccomplished (way too early for that) and no wheels have fallen off – there’s no ‘blood in my shoes’ – but the Monsoon, after weeks of giving us a mere glimpse of stocking, has moved in like Kali on a saturation bombing run, and the filming has dried up accordingly. (ooh, nice juxtaposition)……

It’s 5am and I’m sort of not really on my way home because I don’t want to go to bed – so I’m crouching down at the side of the causeway studying the labored breathing of a rat that is bleeding from the mouth. Its tail is bent and bloody – but its not dying of a broken tail. My diagnosis captain, is he got clipped on the tail by a taxi or somesuch which flipped him up against the wheel at speed, with lethal consequentiality. I look around for something hard enough, like scrap plywood maybe. This is the side of an Indian street – thats not such a longshot! – all I find (strange to relate) is half the cardboard from a cigarette carton. Tough break, kid! I give it a gentle sideways prod in a kerbside direction as it eyes me, maybe thinking why cant this fuck leave me to die in peace? – it cant even hobble, I’m thinking its legs are broke as well. I wonder briefly just how unpleasant the sound and feel of squashing a rat will be, given only cardboard and my shitkickers between me and the micro-horror beneath. On reflection, shoulda kicked him into the middle of the road, let some random traffic deliver the coup de grace (yes, it is always DELIVERED, there is no other way). I didn’t. Maybe they have endorphins too. They don’t do mercy killing here – just like Arsedog1 (all in good time!) – must be something the Buddha said – and as we know – he was a fat bastard!

Wizened old fucker asks me ‘eey maan – yoo wan taxi?’ – tell him I’ve got nowhere to go (!) – but i’m in a playful mood (dying rats an all) so I ask him his name: aapke naam blaah, clocking his sunglasses on the dashboard. ‘They call me Sammy Davis Junior’…….apparently he’s famous round these here parts, and well he should be – because he’s been driving a taxi in Mumbai for 41 years ( ’67, i think) – shitteth thee not. Imagine that!….. stick my head out of the window like a dog that has regained its sight and off we charge at at 15 kph – thats as fast as she goes! We take chai from a stand at the side of Victoria terminus (train station). It rains. We tour all over South Colaba, Sammy pointing out the architectural nodes of colonial decrepitude…..there was nowhere to pee at the chai stand, so we stop at a rubbish tip for me to siphon off…..in the absence of smell-o-vision, can only describe the stench as crippling. I fell sideways – and thats just as well.

Enough! Sayonara Sammy, home, tip, crash, up, bag packed, settle up. Negotiate for the ashtray at SBX – get it for free. Midday beer at Mondegar – ask them to say goodbye to Huxley for me – the manager: good english, firm handshake – likeable fellah!……to Leopolds – order spring rolls to take away, scrambled eggs for now. back to Volga 2, pick up the bag – ask where’s my kung fu silks? – they call the dhobi wallah – they’re on their way. They arrive – hot and damp. Bless ‘em. Back to Leo’s – stuff the spring rolls into the sportsbag, wolf down the eggs, press the flesh with the waiters and wave goodbye to manager Thompson – shoulder the bag, head the hat, hail the cab. Do not miss the train.

Through the subway, find the platform. Take a breath;…take a picture – of the sportsbag sitting on the platform next to the door to carriage 3a. Get on the train, find the bunk, stow the bag. Mission accomplished.

The spring rolls are still hot……………………………….but hey! – we are not the amateur what once we was!

‘this is where the rubber meets the road!’

So I’m coming back from Cafe Mondegar, 2nd most famous place on the Causeway, with a skinful on board, which has taken the edge off spending the entire day roasting my balls trying to get the phone to work.Some of you will recognize this is becoming something of a trend. No matter, I’m on my way home looking forward to a cold shower, a drink of warm water and a typically sleepless night – thats how it is, them’s the breaks.
I step onto the junction corner at Leopold’s that is the only happening spot at kicking-out time, and this teenage punk who has just turned the key on his Bhajaj Bullet (nice gastank, pseudo-Harley affair) is getting ready to pull away from the kerb. ‘Get outta my way’ he says, adding that subtle little lift of the nose and jaw (feel free to practise in the mirror) that says ‘ I have more coolth than you, I recognise you as food for my ego and may command you as I wish’…..or something.

Maybe he’s riding high because he’s scored, maybe he’s showing off his new girlfriend to his pud-pulling footsoldiers….maybe he’s just delusional….all i can tell you is that the impeccably correct response is to look him square in the eye, and simultaneously give him the sublimely disrespectful nose snub back, whilst saying “I’m not in your fucking way!”

He squawks and bleats, the way that teenage punkage does the world over, leaving me amused and thinking shit, boyo – did you EVER choose the wrong day to piss me off. He turns the key back to off…….oooohhh, thats emphatic – and everybody knows it…….No, don’t get off the bike…don’t get off the bike i say, but not too loudly because by this time what I want him to do is….get off the bike. Oh alright then, get off the bike methinks altho this is already turning into typical after-pub ‘verbals’. He wants to fight….i mumble some platitudes to remind him i wasnt in his way, but designed to not sway him from his course of action, and place my cowboy hat on the roof of the taxi, my diary on the bonnet. Let him know I’m taking him seriously – its not in my nature to humiliate one of the lower lifeforms in public…..think of who i would have to answer to for that….(cue scary music)
It could be that I ridiculed him by laughing derisively when i saw him at his full stretch, but I was distracted by the screeching harridan girlfriend, clearly gearing up for some volume 11 verbals of her own. My, but she’s feisty – and the last thing i need is a wannabe amazon I’m not allowed to hit, when i’m squaring up to Johnny Hardcore #1. The usual pitiful micro-drama ensues, i again remind the injured party that i was fully 10 yards away when he hadnt even pulled away, but this is of course merely an adrenalin-gathering exercise. The noise from the idiot harpy is approaching a scream, but this is filtered out because we have arrived at the point where the signals need to be prioritised, and focus on the visual.
Enter stage left Freddy Sixpack and he’s setting off the radar – because he’s sidling up the left flank and he’s more worrying – he has muscles. I remain focussed on the main offender and give him a half-hearted ‘pseudo-bruce’, knowing that he’s already committed, then i incense him with the ‘Morpheus invite’ *, take 2 sidesteps to the left so he’s on my right, and in he comes.Bit like an ambush.
Never learned to fight…not properly, so I really only have one shot. Can see an upper cut with the right in my mind’s eye – but thats never going to happen so the left hook it is. Don’t take your eye off the ball. He hit my fist with the underside of his jaw, went all flexible-like at the knees and bit the pavement harder than Chinese algebra. No time to celebrate – although the girlfriend is satisfyingly muted. Sixpack on my left, incoming, turn and face, breath deeply……..
“you want fight me?…you want fight me?” – more verbals, like he thinks he wants to, but isn’t sure…fortunately he seems to have come from the ‘gutbarging’ school of close combat, so he can be fended off with 4 fingers to the chest as I look him in the eye sayng “Who are you?” repeatedly….it becomes apparent that he’s no friend really of our fallen hero, he just fancied having a crack at….rubbing his belly up against mine.
Johnny hardcore is up and pulling his belt out through its loops, giving it the standard issue “you think you fuck me I fuck you I fuck you real good” blah yawn drone woof woof……the police have turned up complete with paddy wagon and what was farce could turn serious. They push me towards the wagon and ask the assemblage of locals, who have been thoroughly enjoying themselves, for the story. Freddy sixpack seems to think he has been deputised – starts trying to push me into the open backdoor of the paddywagon! – full marks for chutzpah, but really! – what a cunt!
Its time to slip into the night so whilst Mumbai’s finest dig for the truth, thats what i do. All I have to worry about now is whether Johnny fuckup has 29 biker friends who can fight better than he.

Next morning I head to Leopold for breakfast, keep my head down. The guy selling coconut and sweetcorn on the corner recognises me, smiles, and starts shadow-boxing like I was Sylvester Stallone. Oh Shit…….any reputation better than none, I suppose!

Adam x

*from the ‘Neo’s fighting Morpheus!’ scene in ‘The Matrix’

‘this is where the teenage punks face meets the road!’

Opposite the side door to Leopold works the teenage mobile simcard wallah: his shop, like many, is a cupboard on the wall and counter frontage about 3foot long and 8 inches deep. My extensive market research reveals AIRTEL to be a go. You didn’t think I was gonna go with Vodafone did you? – how I love a company that not only embodies, but enshrines the philosophy of customer as ‘the least important part of the equation’. Fuck ‘em!

‘ka kitna?’ I ask, ’400′ he says. Seems a bit steep, given that even the auto-rickshaw wallahs happily ‘bol, bol’ away on their mobiles. ’400?’ I ask, ‘yes yes’ he says as I turn over the cd-sized envelope, simcard and boundless communication possibilities hiding within. MCP Rs99 it says on the back. ‘Not 100?’ I says, pointing to the small print, guessing that MCP can only be RRP Hindustani-style, and hitting him with an eyebrow a la Roger Moore. ‘OK OK 100′, says he.
The boy will go far. Ought to be in banking. Or vodafone.
Victory! You might think……..
I need a passport photocopy, visa photocopy and photograph. That would be to add to the 2-page application form – nationality, address, intended destination, height, weight, penis girth and favorite colour. For a simcard.
Off to the train station we go, photobooth bound. ‘photobooth, photo-me kiosk train station hai?’ ‘Yes yes sir train station’ head wobble no fuckin chance mate, says he, or thereabouts……
Back to the Causeway. Find a camera-wallah whose shopfront is 18 inches wide – it’s a door….between 2 cupboards. 5 for 60 rupees – Value!
Back to Johnny Airtel. Give him the photo, fill out the form, show him the photocopies of passport and visa I keep in my wallet (yeah, I’m baaad)
Fit the new sincard…..’please insert correct simcard’…..network lock. Faff about, digital tech fascism balls-grindage, ….roasted chestnuts.
‘You must go Airtel gallery – Nariman point. Next Abdul ali baba – very famous shop.’
Taxi,60rupes. Ticket. Queue. ‘Why does Indian simcard not work my mobile?…’ ‘You must go Sony Ericsson service center…Lamontagne road’
‘Are you sure?…..’ ‘You must go Sony Ericsson…….’ Breath extremely very deeply. Taxi back,60rupes.
Taxi Lamontagne road.80rupes. Electronics retail and repair city – milages of it….enjoy a brisk sweltering walk admiring the industriousness and reflecting that the neon light and electric signage business is bigger than we give it credit…
‘No no – Sony Ericsson round corner – different entrance, 1st floor’ Ahh, here we are – round the corner, up the stairs, service center painted on the wall…..we have moved to Shree bldg 1st floor Solanki road, nr Minarva cinema, Grant rd.
Minarva cinema? – ‘Yes yes left, till intersection – bridge, Grant road. Walk to intersection…over the bridge… where Minarva cinema is. Is it fuck! Back over the bridge, left up Grant road…its refreshingly humid and still pleasingly scorching hot. Minarva cinema (under construction)….Solanki road…it’s a path, leading to, is that? – yes it’s a Mumbai taxi repair shop! – empty knackered taxi carcass strewn about……opposite the Shree bldg wherein lies my true love. 1st floor, no sign…got a security guard tho – he’s guarding the ticket machine. ‘Is 6 o’clock, we are closed now – tomorrow is ok!’ take a long hard look at the hours of business card on the wall – in case they hit me with a 3 hour lunch break tomorrow. Taxi back,80rupes.
Taxi to Solanki path,80rupes. They’ve put the engine back in I note – just the carpet and seats to go then. 1st floor, ticket, queue.
‘this is network lock. We not do unlock here’
‘but this IS Sony Ericsson service cen..’
‘we not do unlock here – Manish market’ – she’s being very Chinese about it.
‘Who?’
‘Manish market – is famous – near Crawford market’.
The overriding problem with the AK47 is there’s never one around when you need one. Taxi to Manish mkt, 60rupes. Computerised mobile phone repair nexus rabbit warren sweltering shithole. ‘Ram electronics’….just one of what must be over 200. Ram…Ram Dass….Ram Ram Sitaram* – I think I’ll give him a go…..’You can do?’….’yes yes, unlock, half hour’. 450 Rs – sounds steep. Look around – there’s 200-odd mobile phone circuitboard solder-wallahs – ‘fair price?’ I ask, trying the eyebrow thing. He holds firm, invites me to ask any of the others…I fold, 450 it is, half hour.
Two hours later I go for lunch. Dirty and smelly. I’m the 1st ferengi here since ’47…..1847. ‘No Spitting’ it says, painted on the wall. So it’s authentic.
Back to circuitboard city, where by now of course my phone will be ready.
Well shit on my chest what a surprise! ‘its not the phone – it is the files’. It transpires that yesterday his hard drive crashed and its possible that some of his (pirate) Sony Ericsson files might still be somewhat corrupted…….not corrupted enough to pass on the business tho, obviously. ’1/2 hour more’. I ask him ‘can you do this? – if this is going to be a problem I want to know now – not in 3 hours’. ’1/2 hour more’
After an hour, I sit outside the unit and meditate…..recalling Nicolas Cage in ‘Con-air’ to the helplessly outnumbered DEA agent : ‘look man, you’re in a situation you cannot control’…..time passes…..a nice gentle tap on the shoulder.Respectful,like, what with me being all spiritual and all. Hallelujah!
‘Perhaps you could leave phone and come back tomorrow…I call you when is done?…..’
The world has stopped turning.
Time stands still, and the decision tree of your possible choices and their consequences branch out before you…….. This doesn’t surprise you because obviously you created this yourself – you have manifested your own fears using the strength of negative emotions. Very successfully. Leave the building now – breathe more deeply than you have ever fucking breathed before and please ignore the fact that everything has turned red – and put your hands in your pockets where they cant kill anyone stone dead on the spot. Balls now impersonating microwaved piglets in noodle soup, and definitely cant have kids.
Taxi back,50rupes.
(Good job I didn’t come across a teenage punk on a motorbike telling me to get out of his way…….)
The next day Ram doesn’t bother to phone the hotel….I phone, its ready.
Taxi to Manish mkt,50rupes. Missed a days filming, 500rupes.get Ran to prove it works with a spare Airtel simcard. Pay the 450Rs, get receipt. Taxi back,50rupes. No messing about, Airtel Johnny – simcard 100rupes, ram it in, initial topup, 350rupes, its taken a week and a half but we are good to go.

The text is all in Hindi……

Adam x

‘this is where the rubber meets the road!’

* Krishna Dass ‘live on earth – for a short time only’…double album live, treat yourself!

Not going to become a filmstar by drinking cobra at Leopolds, so I thought I’d pull my finger out. Did a 2nd day on the ‘30s-based tv soap –’Monay rana dey’ we think its called – walking past the camera, sitting at the tables pretending to converse as the camera pans over you before closing in on the principals, that sort of thing. Much sitting around, sweating of the pink bits.

Much sitting in the bus, enjoying the cacophonous melee that is Mumbai traffic, more of a variable-speed fluid parking lot. Feature film debut: running about in the background dressed as a new york cop, behind Sabrina (who lives and works out here for Yash Raj studios, #1 production house) – playing an on the spot newscaster ['New York’ Y.R. films,2008]
Much photo-taking of us in police uniform by the French guys with me on this one. Forget to give them my email address, so those are lost to the ether.
Train up to Andheri west (n.Mumbai) for an audition – speaking part, east India company bigwig 1947 type thing. Critical part the casting director tells me, the camcorder winking ominously in the background. Got to deliver the lines in Hindi. Both paragraphs! He tells me to take them home and come back tomorrow. Memorize the lines. Perfectly. Back to Andheri, on goes the camcorder and away I go…”tum logo ko yahin trade karne hai te hume tax dena hi hoga….” pretty good for a novice methinks…”yahin Bengal area mein tax karne aur kilebanddhi karne ki faarman diye hai….” Delivered not quite flawlessly but pronounced so plain wrong he cant understand a word!
Done shoulda learned me that Hindi afore I came shoulda woulda coulda. There’s 10-12 thousand rupees a day all shot to hell and gone!
Imran is my man – the hardest-working of what are known as ‘colaba trawlers’, see him pretty much everyday. Asks me to do 4 days on the trot – and can I find him a couple of girls also…..
Catch ‘get smart’ because Steve Carrell is on the crest of a wave and is always funny; and that Anne Hathaway…..scorchio!

Do the 1st days shoot on ‘Dhostani’ – it’s a Mumbai modification (ripoff) of ‘the devil wears prada’…..Imran has corralled some 18 fellow suckers (it’s the 1st day of shooting adams, I cannot fuckup!). the driver takes the wrong route despite Imrans specific instructions, thus taking a mere 3hours and 40 mins to get to the set. Deep joy. Balls like roasted chestnuts. Probably cant have kids.
Spend the next 10 hours being sidelined for every shot like a spare cock at the wedding. I shitteth thee not – they use EVERYBODY, passing shots, background artiste-ing, being busy and I’m sent out of shot, every shot. The whole day. As Leicester Bob would say…fuck this for a game of soldiers!
Then I learn that the part I missed out on from the audition is for the new Salman Khan film.(bit of a big cheese)
Still, got to meet Abhai Deol and….Priyanka Chopra. Yup, she reeaaal purdty

Adam

‘this is where the rubber meets the road!’

so I’m in this car, little fiat 1100 put-put, prolly from the ’50s – tho it could pass for the ’30s which is just as well.Dave the Canadian charter pilot is driving – we’re leaving a swanky joint called ‘the elite club’. – wearing ’30s gear.As instructed, we slow to a halt for the gates to open, we react to something sailing down in front of the gates – just have time to turn to Dave and mouthe..’oh fuc…KABOOM! – louder than i expected, i feel the heatflash on the windscreen.

we were told not to get out of the car. the gate-wallahs have scarpered – prolly to escape the horde of raging indian freedom fighters who have stormed down the hill and surrounded the car – the doors are yanked open – we’re pulled from the car – its not looking good……I’m slammed up against the car,they knock my hat off and rip off my jacket – we’re in trouble…this brutish thug fancies himself a patriot jestures for me to wear an indian shirt (kurta) – i look at him contemptuous like – punch to the midriff, get slapped, spun around – off comes the tie and shirt – its going much the same for dave on the drivers side.’ok ok ok’ i say, being generally pushed about and outnumbered – on goes the shirt, and i’m forced to shout ‘BHARAT MATA KE-JIR – repeatedly…..we’re pushed towards the club, where the assembled shocked ferenghi are about to receive the same…….

“CUT” – good shot,everybody…well done mr adams, says the director…good work….mind-blowing mr adams, says the brutish thug.

And thats the sort of thing that makes it worthwhile….you know, for us professional actors…….

“i thought”, Dave said,”we were just going to be standing in the background……”

“Yeah”, i said, smiling cryptically……”not bad for a debut…….”

Spent the next 6 hours sitting round dehydratring and doing fuck all!……..

thanks for the mugshots – you know who you are.
Adam x

‘this is where the rubber meets the road!’

11 days in, sports bag performing well,atm situation good, washkit ideal, clothes selection damn-near perfect, hat still pristine, the beer has doubled in price!

pretty much now down to me and Hei##, the shit-grumpy girl from Finland, whose ability to kill an attempt at conversation is matched only by her unwillingness to engage in any form of interaction across the entire spectrum……..aah, fuck ‘em.

So we shook hands and said goodbye to ####an (discretion required) who became best drinking muckah – done his travelling smoking and reading, but most importantly, doesn’t fall off a cliff after the 3rd beer (cf 2006, the drunken mumbai dildo disaster)….. – and this is what you need when you’re up to your elbows in the stink and filth and assorted Indian armpit. Miserable fucker at 1st i thought, but it turns out he’s been put thruogh the wringer in P######, including a protracted stay at an exclusive ashram at his maharaja’s pleasure, so to speak….’lawyers guns and money’ – the whole picture – enough to shit on anyone’s bhaji!

CSOSIPIR – commonplace side of street indeterminate pile of Indian rubbish….its all over the shop!

So even if i dont become a film star, as you can prolly imagine i’m certainly styling myself out as such, and it appears to be working, at least at (the world famous) ‘Leopolds’ in Colaba, where i’m currently hunkered down at the sally ally’s red shield hostel (for the majestic rent of two pounds and sixpence a night)…..friday night and this hindi young blade fancies a picture of hisself wearing the cowboy hat, so i acompany him to his table, they do the snaps, i take my hat back, head back to my table…to rousing applause (for what?) so i turn and smile – the whole restaurant gives me a cheer – so i give them a suspicion of a bow, and hit them with the pseudo-Bruce chop socky (2 and a half seconds worth) – i shit thee not, TUMULTUOUS APPLAUSE, from the entire restaurant…..(ladies and gentlemen, members of the academy, i’d like to thank…..)

Bizarre, but HUGELY rewarding…..

have avoided the ‘extras’ work thus far…(dahling, it was simply ghastly – the whole day for a mere 500 rupees, and all they wanted was for me to gyrate in the background…..)

but really, you gotta show these fuckers you’re serious – i’m here to ACT….

If i cant find a speaking part after a month…figure its up north to Mohenjdro Daro….its not on the map, but then technically its an archeological site….used to be a city mind, but then someone dropped an atomic bomb on it and thats all she wrote….no they didnt tell about that, but then it was anywhere between 12 and 18 thousand years ago…

Suck on that and try it for size!!!!

gotta go, apparently its Spain v Italy (whoop-de-fakkin’-doo!), but Ellie and Elsie have just shipped in, i said come and have a beer, ‘cos as Carlos will tell you…..

‘IT AIN’T ALL GLAMOUR!’

hallelujah shitfire, and, as ever….

‘this is where the rubber meets the road!’